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﻿Horizontal Vs Vertical Filter

A lot of people have asked recently why I offer a vertical filter only in the RF2 kit ('93-'08 touring bikes with dual exhaust). The reason for this is that the RF2 kit requires a vertical filter while everything else can use a horizontal filter and I am firmly convinced that horizontal is the better option, for several reasons.

1. The horizontal filter is easier and less messy to change. I know... that seems completely backwards, but if you think about it, the horizontal filter in the stock location is such a huge pain in the neck because as soon as you crack it loose it starts draining all over the place. In this case, though, that's a good thing. There's nothing under it but the drain pan so there's no mess to deal with. You crack it, and in just a few seconds, it's completely drained and you spin it the rest of the way off. A spin-on filter in the vertical position always has some oil laying on top of the anti-drainback valve. When you crack a vertical filter loose, that residual oil tends to run down the side of the filter canister. It all runs right down into the drain pan, so there's still no mess, but now you're handling a filter with hot, dirty oil all over the outside of it as opposed to handling a clean, dry filter. Given a choice, I'll take clean and dry every time.

2. You can still pre-fill a horizontal filter. You can't fill it completely to the top, but you can fill it about halfway, which is a lot better than you can pre-fill a horizontal filter in the stock location (or at least better than I've ever been able to pre-fill one in the stock location). My horizontally mounted remote filter, pre-filled halfway, will make oil pressure a whole lot quicker than an empty filter horizontally mounted in the stock location does. Quite honestly, pre-filling is way overblown to begin with. In an automotive engine, where a thin film of pressurized oil is the crankshaft bearing, it's far more important than it is in engines like ours that have roller bearings on the crankshaft. That being said, I still pre-fill mine just because old habits die hard.

3. With the vertical filter you can't add a thermostat for adding my oil cooler (or any other) at the rear of the bike as the filter would end up hanging too low. You may want to add my cooler down the road as it gives up its heat via radiation as opposed to convection, meaning it requires no airflow whatsoever and will cool the oil sitting dead still at idle. By virtue of its size alone it has proven to be far more effective than anything else I’ve seen. I do have some bikes out there that are running dual coolers. They run mine in the rear and a standard tube/fin type in the front. Having a thermostat for each cuts down on the plumbing by a lot. In all honesty, with my cooler in the rear there's no need for one in the front but the guys running them already had them in place and it certainly can't hurt anything to leave it there.

4. A vertical setup is more expensive and about to get even more so. With the filter vertical, stainless hard lines have to be used in order to make the tight bend that's required.

I guess the best endorsement I can give for the horizontal filter is that I obviously have the ability to run either, and I choose to run the horizontal on my personal bike (the orange Ultra that's pictured below).

Remote Oil Filter Kit part # RF1-9308

Fits 1993-2008 Harley-Davidson® Touring/FXR with 2 into 1 pipe or staggered duals. This kit will NOT fit bikes that have a pipe on the left side. For those bikes, please see our RF2 kit. Pictured with optional thermostatic oil cooler. Oil cooler not included but is available separately.

Please use the button below to access the order page where you can use the convenient dropdown boxes to choose the finish options you'd like. Please be advised, the polished option is not a very good value for your dollar. Polished metals require upkeep in the way of periodic repolishing to maintain their mirror shine and once these parts are mounted with fittings installed, repolishing them is next to impossible.

Please use the button below to access the order page where you can use the convenient dropdown boxes to choose the finish options you'd like. Please be advised, the polished option is not a very good value for your dollar. Polished metals require upkeep in the way of periodic repolishing to maintain their mirror shine and once these parts are mounted with fittings installed, repolishing them is next to impossible.

Fits '09 and newer Harley-Davidson®Touring bikes with stock exhaust or 2 into 1 pipe. It is NOT compatible with Vance & Hines Power Duals or other aftermarket cross-under systems that have larger diameter heat shields than stock.

Please use the button below to access the order page where you can use the convenient dropdown boxes to choose the finish options you'd like. Please be advised, the polished option is not a very good value for your dollar. Polished metals require upkeep in the way of periodic repolishing to maintain their mirror shine and once these parts are mounted with fittings installed, repolishing them is next to impossible.

Evo Bare Bones- Save $35

If your pre-'99 Touring Bike (and of course FXR) is Evo powered you can save yourself $50, and achieve an entirely different look, by doing just a little extra work. Where your bike's filter mounts from the factory is simply another form of remote filter mount. It's just really big and it's in that terrible location that we've all grown to hate so badly over the years. You can remove the factory remote filter mount entirely and run new lines directly from the oil pump to our remote filter mount, "cleaning up" the front of your engine and reducing the amount of parts required to finally put an end to the mess when changing your oil filter.If you decide to go this route, you won't need the spin-on adapter ($25 price reduction), and you'll need only 4' of hose as opposed to 10' of hose ($9 price reduction). The extra buck off is just because we can... and why not? You can also run the complete kit(s) as pictured above if you so choose with no problems whatsoever.If you want to go with the Evo Bare Bones setup just drop us an email and we'll get you fixed up.